Across the ZodiacBy: Percy Greg (1836-1889)

First Page:

"Thoughts he sends to each planet,
Uranus, Venus, and Mars;
Soars to the Centre to span it,
Numbers the infinite Stars."

Courthope's Paradise of Birds

CONTENTS

I. SHIPWRECK.

II. OUTWARD BOUND.

III. THE UNTRAVELLED DEEP.

IV. A NEW WORLD.

V. LANGUAGE, LAWS, AND LIFE.

VI. AN OFFICIAL VISIT.

VII. ESCORT DUTY.

VIII. A FAITH AND ITS FOUNDER.

IX. MANNERS AND CUSTOMS.

X. WOMAN AND WEDLOCK.

XI. A COUNTRY DRIVE.

XII. ON THE RIVER.

XIII. THE CHILDREN OF LIGHT.

XIV. BY SEA.

XV. FUR HUNTING.

XVI. TROUBLED WATERS.

XVII. PRESENTED AT COURT.

XVIII. A PRINCE'S PRESENT.

XIX. A COMPLETE ESTABLISHMENT.

XX. LIFE, SOCIAL AND DOMESTIC.

XXI. PRIVATE AUDIENCES.

XXII. PECULIAR INSTITUTIONS.

XXIII. CHARACTERISTICS.

XXIV. WINTER.

XXV. APOSTACY.

XXVI. TWILIGHT.

XXVII. THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW.

XXVIII. DARKER YET.

XXIX. AZRAEL.

XXX. FAREWELL.

CHAPTER I SHIPWRECK.

Once only, in the occasional travelling of thirty years, did I lose
any important article of luggage; and that loss occurred, not under
the haphazard, devil take the hindmost confusion of English, or the
elaborate misrule of Continental journeys, but through the absolute
perfection and democratic despotism of the American system. I had to
give up a visit to the scenery of Cooper's best Indian novels no
slight sacrifice and hasten at once to New York to repair the loss.
This incident brought me, on an evening near the middle of September
1874, on board a river steamboat starting from Albany, the capital of
the State, for the Empire City. The banks of the lower Hudson are as
well worth seeing as those of the Rhine itself, but even America has
not yet devised means of lighting them up at night, and consequently I
had no amusement but such as I could find in the conversation of my
fellow travellers. With one of these, whose abstinence from personal
questions led me to take him for an Englishman, I spoke of my visit to
Niagara the one wonder of the world that answers its warranty and to
Montreal. As I spoke of the strong and general Canadian feeling of
loyalty to the English Crown and connection, a Yankee bystander
observed

"Wal, stranger, I reckon we could take 'em if we wanted tu!"

"Yes," I replied, "if you think them worth the price. But if you do,
you rate them even more highly than they rate themselves; and English
colonists are not much behind the citizens of the model Republic in
honest self esteem."

"Wal," he said, "how much du yew calc'late we shall hev to pay?"

"Not more, perhaps, than you can afford; only California, and every
Atlantic seaport from Portland to Galveston."

"Reckon yew may be about right, stranger," he said, falling back with
tolerable good humour; and, to do them justice, the bystanders seemed
to think the retort no worse than the provocation deserved.

"I am sorry," said my friend, "you should have fallen in with so
unpleasant a specimen of the character your countrymen ascribe with
too much reason to Americans. I have been long in England, and never
met with such discourtesy from any one who recognised me as an
American."

After this our conversation became less reserved; and I found that I
was conversing with one of the most renowned officers of irregular
cavalry in the late Confederate service a service which, in the
efficiency, brilliancy, and daring of that especial arm, has never
been surpassed since Maharbal's African Light Horse were recognised by
friends and foes as the finest corps in the small splendid army of
Hannibal.

Colonel A (the reader will learn why I give neither his name nor
real rank) spoke with some bitterness of the inquisitiveness which
rendered it impossible, he said, to trust an American with a secret,
and very difficult to keep one without lying... Continue reading book >>